"Go back to Jessica," the lovely voice ordered, still angry. "You promised-nothing stupid."
I was alone. Jessica stood a few feet from me, staring at me with frightened eyes. Against the wall, the strangers watched, confused, wondering what I was doing, standing there motionless in the middle of the street.
I shook my head, trying to understand. I knew he wasn't there, and yet, he felt improbably close, close for the first time since . . . since the end. The anger in his voice was concern, the same anger that was once very familiar-something I hadn't heard in what felt like a lifetime.
"Keep your promise." The voice was slipping away, as if the volume was being turned down on a radio.
I began to suspect that I was having some kind of hallucination. Triggered, no doubt, by the memory-the déjà vu, the strange familiarity of the situation.
I ran through the possibilities quickly in my head.
Option one: I was crazy. That was the layman's term for people who heard voices in their heads.
Possible.
Option two: My subconscious mind was giving me what it thought I wanted. This was wish fulfillment-a momentary relief from pain by embracing the incorrect idea that he cared whether I lived or died. Projecting what he would have said if A) he were here, and B) he would be in any way bothered by something bad happening to me.
Probable.
I could see no option three, so I hoped it was the second option and this was just my subconscious running amuck, rather than something I would need to be hospitalized for.
My reaction was hardly sane, though-I was grateful. The sound of his voice was something that I'd feared I was losing, and so, more than anything else, I felt overwhelming gratitude that my unconscious mind had held onto that sound better than my conscious one had.
I was not allowed to think of him. That was something I tried to be very strict about. Of course I slipped; I was only human. But I was getting better, and so the pain was something I could avoid for days at a time now. The trade-off was the never-ending numbness. Between pain and nothing, I'd chosen nothing.
I waited for the pain now. I was not numb-my senses felt unusually intense after so many months of the haze-but the normal pain held off. The only ache was the disappointment that his voice was fading.
There was a second of choice.
The wise thing would be to run away from this potentially destructive-and certainly mentally unstable-development. It would be stupid to encourage hallucinations.
But his voice was fading.
I took another step forward, testing.
"Bella, turn around," he growled.
I sighed in relief. The anger was what I wanted to hear-false, fabricated evidence that he cared, a dubious gift from my subconscious.
Very few seconds had passed while I sorted this all out. My little audience watched, curious. It probably looked like I was just dithering over whether or not I was going to approach them. How could they guess that I was standing there enjoying an unexpected moment of insanity?
"Hi," one of the men called, his tone both confident and a bit sarcastic. He was fair-skinned and fair-haired, and he stood with the assurance of someone who thought of himself as quite good-looking. I couldn't tell whether he was or not. I was prejudiced.
The voice in my head answered with an exquisite snarl. I smiled, and the confident man seemed to take that as encouragement.
"Can I help you with something? You look lost." He grinned and winked.
I stepped carefully over the gutter, running with water that was black in the darkness.
"No. I'm not lost."
Now that I was closer-and my eyes felt oddly in focus-I analyzed the short, dark man's face. It was not familiar in any way. I suffered a curious sensation of disappointment that this was not the terrible man who had tried to hurt me almost a year ago.
The voice in my head was quiet now.
The short man noticed my stare. "Can I buy you a drink?" he offered, nervous, seeming flattered that I'd singled him out to stare at.
"I'm too young," I answered automatically.
He was baffled-wondering why I had approached them. I felt compelled to explain.
"From across the street, you looked like someone I knew. Sorry, my mistake."
The threat that had pulled me across the street had evaporated. These were not the dangerous men I remembered. They were probably nice guys. Safe. I lost interest.
"That's okay," the confident blond said. "Stay and hang out with us."
"Thanks, but I can't." Jessica was hesitating in the middle of the street, her eyes wide with outrage and betrayal.
"Oh, just a few minutes."
I shook my head, and turned to rejoin Jessica.
"Let's go eat," I suggested, barely glancing at her. Though I appeared to be, for the moment, freed of the zombie abstraction, I was just as distant. My mind was preoccupied. The safe, numb deadness did not come back, and I got more anxious with every minute that passed without its return.